


Ghosts

by minervaparadi_no



Category: Artemis Fowl - Eoin Colfer
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Ghost Hunters, Gen, Ghosts, Major Character Undeath, no beta we die like artemis does in this au, the consequences of being too dramatic to give your friends actual proper instructions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-15
Packaged: 2021-03-16 08:07:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29450526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/minervaparadi_no/pseuds/minervaparadi_no
Summary: Beckett and Myles Fowl start aGhost Hunting ShowParanormal Investigation Program. For their first case, they’re investigating the rumours of a mysterious creature haunting Fowl Manor, the place where their brother died years ago.
Relationships: Artemis Fowl II & Beckett Fowl & Myles Fowl, Artemis Fowl II & Holly Short, Beckett Fowl & Myles Fowl
Comments: 8
Kudos: 31
Collections: Artemis Fowl Big Bang 2021





	1. Chapter One

Foaly had been feeling optimistic that day. His morning coffee had tasted sweeter, and Haven’s artificial lights seemed brighter than usual. Whistling, he sat at his desk and prepared for what would hopefully be a good day at work.

Trouble dropped a thick file on Foaly’s desk.

"What's this for?" Foaly wasn’t a fan of paperwork.

"The report on the Fowls’ latest little adventure,” said Trouble, “You need to write it,”

"I'm not doing that. I'm the tech wizard, the LEP does not pay me to write reports,"

"Well nobody else is going to write it, and you just so happened to have been the only one missing from missed the meeting,"

“What meeting?”

“The one we had yesterday, discussing this case,” he said, “The one I sent you five emails reminding you about?”

"Yesterday?” Foaly searched his memory. The only thing he remembered from yesterday was the candlelit dinner he’d had with his wife, “I was on a date with Caballine yesterday!”

"Your wife isn’t more important than work," 

"That’s rich coming from you, Kelp, seeing as your love life is a mess,"

“Hey!”

“It’s true, isn’t it? The last person you dated was Holly, and I hear that didn’t go too well,”

"Just do the report.” Trouble sighed, “We've got a recording of the events. Watch it then write down what happened,"

"Fine,” he grumbled. Trouble left Foaly alone to do his work. Digging through the file, he found several interview transcriptions, a strange note from Holly asking him to meet with her later and a disk with multiple scribbled out titles that someone had marked as _Fowl Case #11._

"Might as well get this over with," he said as he inserted the disk into the computer.

* * *

The two youngest Fowls sat behind a desk. Myles was dressed as usual in an expensive custom tailored suit, his dark hair nearly slicked back. His twin Beckett on the other hand wore a plain white shirt paired with his pet fish Gloop, who’d been laminated and turned into a tie, and his curly blonde hair was as messy as ever. Myles spoke first.

“Hello. My twin Beckett and I bring to you today the very first episode of _Paranormal Investigation With The Fowl Twins_ ,” 

Beckett pushed a button on the desk, causing a banner reading _Myles & Beckett’s Ghost Hunting Show _ to drop from the ceiling along with a fair amount of confetti.

“In this world, there are many things that humanity has deemed ‘unexplainable’, such as the Bermuda Triangle,” Myles brushed a brightly colored piece of paper from his hair, “And what happens to socks in the dryer. My brother and I have started this program to shed some light on these mysteries,”

“And for for our first case,” Beckett said, “We’re going to investigate Fowl Manor,”

Myles explained, “Once home to one of the world’s greatest criminal families, the manor has been gifted to the public since the death of our eldest brother Artemis, when our father decided to relocate the family to a private island. The rise of the agriculture industry since the Big Dark, when technology mysteriously failed, paired with the plentiful space on the manor led to it becoming a place for farming. For a while, the people did their work in peace in peace, but then strange things started happening. We are going to discover what’s behind the mystery,”

“Even though we already know it’s Artemis,”

“Beckett no,”

“Who else could it be? The ghost is haunting Fowl Manor, Artemis died at Fowl Manor, and I’m pretty sure no one else died at Fowl Manor, though it is a pretty old place,”

“It’s not Artemis’s ghost because ghosts don’t exist,” Myles frowned, “There is simply no evidence indicating someone could return to this world after they died,”

“There isn’t any evidence proving they can’t either,” Beckett pointed out. 

Myles found himself unable to argue with that logic, so he changed the subject, “We will now interview some witnesses in order to make sense of what is happening at the manor,”

* * *

Myles sat on a couch next to a woman with dark hair. She had a steaming cup of tea in her hands. Myles had also been given one, but it lay on the coffee table in front of him, untouched.

The woman smiled kindly, “So you two are working on a school project or something?” 

“We’re actually making a ghost hunting show!” Beckett piped up from behind the camera.

She laughed, “That’s nice, boys. So what would you like to know?”

“You were a farmer working at Fowl Manor, weren’t you Miss Anderson?” Myles asked.

“That's right. I planted some good carrots on that land,”

“And did you see this alleged ‘ghost’ rumoured to be there,”

“Well no, but I saw what it did. We’d been storing plenty of tools in this one shed, and one day… everything disappeared,” she shivered.

Myles raised his eyebrows, “That’s hardly evidence of paranormal activity. It’s just as likely to have been pranksters or thieves,”

She shrugged, “We all thought that too at first, but then even weirder things started happening,”

* * *

“Name’s Jack Jackson,” the man was tall, and he had a bushy mustache. He leaned against a tree, “I saw something _real_ creepy at that manor,”

Myles asked, “What was it?”

“After our tools were stolen, we’d lock up the place, for security. But one day I headed inside the building and saw it. ‘ _Go away_ ’, written in blood. No sign of forced entry. It just appeared out of nowhere,”

“Are you sure it was blood?” Myles frowned, “Whose blood would it even be?”

“I don’t know. What other scary reddish liquid is there?

“Quite a few actually, but that doesn’t matter. Did anything happen afterwards?”

“I didn’t say stick around to find out. You should ask someone else. Like my friend River. He stayed a little longer, and he saw something real _terrifying_ ,”

* * *

“I saw the ghost with my own two eyes,” said River, “Well, not _see_ exactly, because the ghost was _invisible_ ,”

Myles was interested by this fact, “What happened with the _ghost_?” 

“You know that decorative sword hanging in the front room?”

“I remember that!” Beckett said, “I’m pretty sure it wasn’t just decorative though-” Myles shushed him then gestured at River to continue,”

“One day, it just got up and started swinging around by itself, attacking people. It was just sort of floating. Then someone attacked the air around it with their shovel, and the ghost dropped the sword,” he gestured to his bandage-wrapped leg, “Right onto my foot,”

“Scary,” whispered Beckett.

“Pretty much everyone left after that,” River said, “We thought it was too dangerous to return,”

“Dangerous?”

“My foot was the only casualty that day, but who knows what’ll happen next time. No one wants to risk their lives just to farm,” River seemed uncomfortable, “I really don’t think you should go there. Even adults were too scared to go there, and you two are just kids,”

“I am more intelligent than most adults,” Myles said, “And my brother here is a black belt in multiple forms of martial arts,”

“I can even do the cluster punch,” Beckett said.

Myles smiled at River, “We are not just kids. We can handle it,”

* * *

The twins’ entry to Fowl Manor had been delayed by the fact that someone had locked the gates, and the key was hidden among tens of others on the rusty keyring they’d been given. Myles had spent five minutes trying key after key, but none of them opened the lock.

“Have you given up yet, Myles?” Beckett was growing impatient.

Myles frowned, “I cannot find the key that will unlock this gate. It’s possible that none of them will help us get in,”

“River did think it was too dangerous for us to go in there,” Beckett realised.

“I suppose we don’t really have a choice. The only thing we can do is-”

“Climb the gates!” Beckett shouted. Myles began to protest, but his brother had already started climbing. He managed it surprisingly well considering he was carrying the heavy bag of equipment _and_ the camera. Myles considered his options. Go home and embarrass himself in front of Beckett by backing down, or climb the gates and embarrass himself in front of Beckett by absolutely failing to climb the gates.

He chose the latter. It was no secret Myles favoured mental strength compared to physical strength. He put his foot on the gate and glanced at Beckett, who had long reached the other side and was recording Myles. 

After much struggling, Myles stood with his brother in the grounds of Fowl Manor. It had changed a lot since they were children, the fancy landscaping had become spots for farming.

“Let’s go inside,” Beckett seemed excited, “That’s where the the ghost will probably be,”

“Where the _paranormal activity_ will be,” Myles corrected his brother. 

“Potayto, potahto,” Beckett said before running into the house. Myles followed him at a far more dignified pace. The interior was dark, and a flick of the light switch proved that the manor hadn’t been connected to the new power grid that had popped up after the fall of technology. Fortunately, the camera had a built in flashlight. Myles watched Beckett record all the old furniture and trinkets, giving strange and most likely incorrect facts as commentary.

“Beckett!” Myles called out. His brother, who had been distracted by a small ceramic acorn, turned the camera towards Myles.

“Here we finally are in Fowl Manor, my family’s former home. It has stood empty for the past year ever since a mysterious entity that is most definitely _not_ a ghost-” Myles glared at Beckett as he said the words, “-scared off the last of the farmers. We are the first people to return, and we are going to find whatever’s behind all this,”

“Our brother,” Beckett said, “We’re going to find our brother,”


	2. Chapter Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> @bella-ciao-procrastinates made some incredible [art](https://bella-ciao-procrastinates.tumblr.com/post/643160909700808704/its-the-artemis-fowl-big-bang-2021) of a scene from this chapter, so go look at it and shower them with reblogs!

“Allow me to explain the plan for tracking down this entity,” Myles took the camera from Beckett, who dumped the contents of his bag onto the floor.

“Here we’ve got some candy, for bait,” Beckett held a packet of gummy worms to the camera, “We’ve also got whatever this thing is,” he waved around a small purple cube.

“Be careful with that!” Myles dropped the camera and grabbed the cube from his brother, “This is a delicate device,”

“So was the camera!” Beckett gently picked it up, “What if you broke it?”

“The camera doesn’t matter! You could buy as many of them as you want at any time. On the other hand, _this_ -” Myles held up the cube, “-is one of a kind. I spent weeks perfecting it. This cube will help us detect the source of the strange activity. You see,”

Myles began to explain the inner workings of his invention in great detail. Beckett watched Myles talk, but after a few minutes he grew bored and pushed a button on the cube, which immediately started flashing and beeping.

“Beckett!” Myles glared at his brother, who simply shrugged.

“Nobody wants to listen to your science-y talk, Myles,” he said, “Use your cube and track down the ghost already,”

Myles grumbled but picked up the cube anyway. He held it up and walked around, looking for spots where the beeps grew louder and the flashes more frequent.

“Here,” Myles turned off the cube and looked at a closet, “This is a huge source of energy,”

Beckett threw open the doors and he peered inside, “I can’t see anything except-” a dark shape jumped over his head and crashed into Myles.

Myles yelled back in fear as Beckett gleefully recorded his brother’s reaction to being scared by what was now clearly a regular old raccoon.

Myles scowled at his laughing brother, “You would be just as shocked if a _Procyon lotor_ attacked you like that,”

“He didn’t attack you on purpose, Myles,” Becky pet the raccoon lovingly, “He was just a little surprised. He’s very sorry about it,”

Myles calmed himself, then turned to the closet, “The cube detected something, yet the raccoon seemed to have been alone inside the closet,”

“Maybe he’s the source of the energy!” Beckett exclaimed. He turned to the raccoon and started chittering at it. Myles ignored this.

“Perhaps my invention malfunctioned? No, that is _impossible_. Maybe the raccoon-? Maybe whatever the source of the energy is came in contact with the raccoon and left some sort of residue!”

“Frederick says you’re right Myles! He saw the ghost. It was green, and it bumped into him, then flew off _that_ way!” Beckett pointed towards a hallway.

Myles, who did not want to accept facts from a raccoon, considered this for a moment, “Well I suppose listening to ‘Frederick’ is as good as any other course of action we could take,” 

“Let’s go!” Beckett headed towards the hallway, his twin following him. They passed multiple doors and corridors, Myles’s cube giving no indication there was anything strange happening nearby. Beckett went ahead to see if he could find something cool, and that was when he saw it.

“Myles, look! It’s the message Jack Jackson found!”

Myles stepped forward and stared at the words. 

_GO AWAY_

“Is it blood?” Beckett asked.

“I don’t think so, but it’s hard to be certain,” Myles reached out to touch the reddish brown writing, but decided against it, “We should keep moving,”

Myles led the way upstairs. Beckett followed him, pointing the camera at various items and giving his commentary. 

"This is the gift that Artemis gave me for my birthday,” lying on a table was a keychain with an anime style elf on it, "It was my favourite present ever!"

Myles muttered something that couldn't be heard. Beckett continued talking, “We left it here when we moved out because it made Mom sad to look at it,”

“Mother was upset by anything that reminded her of Artemis,” Myles suddenly stopped walking and looked up at the walls.

"This is the hall of dead Fowls!" Beckett said cheerily, "It's where we kept the portraits of our family members who died,"

"This is our third great grandfather Alexander Fowl," said Myles, "And next to him is our second cousin thrice removed Marcus Fowl,"

"And this is Artemis!" Beckett held the camera in front of a portrait of the infamous Artemis Fowl II. The look on his face was not one he would have worn in life, and neither were the clothes the portrait depicted him in. His mother Angeline had probably been behind it, taking advantage of Artemis’s absence in order to have a picture of the boy she wanted to remember instead of the one who’d died.

"I can’t wait to meet him," Beckett said.

Myles stared into the camera, a look of annoyance on his face. Beckett said to him, "You still don't believe he's here?"

"You still do?"

"Artemis is here with us, as sure as the Earth is flat,"

Myles shook his head, “We’ll find out soon enough,”

“When we find him, I have so many questions to ask him! Like what his favourite colour is, where he got all that slime, was Mom always so-?”

The device in Myles’s hand started beeping, and he looked at his brother.

“Let’s look for the source of this weird energy,”

They followed the cube to a room filled with cardboard boxes. Beckett opened one and coughed as a cloud of dust flew out. Inside he found various items that had been left behind when the Fowls moved out of the manor. Aside from those, the room was empty, with no signs a ghost or anything else had been there.

“Maybe my machine really is starting to malfunction…” Myles looked dejected.

As if on cue, a pile of boxes crashed to the ground.

“What was that?!” Myles didn’t see any living things besides himself and Beckett. What the farmer had said was true then. This mysterious thing was invisible.

“Show yourself, ghost!” Beckett said. The ghost did not listen to his command and stayed invisible. He looked around the room, searching for any sign of movement.

“Beckett, look!” Myles gestured to a faint blur in the air. The camera didn’t pick it up clearly but it was undeniably present. It moved out the open doors and slammed them shut.

By the time the twins had opened the doors again and moved out into the hallway, the blur was nowhere to be found. Beckett, the far more athletic of the two, picked a random direction and ran, recording every step with the camera. His brother, who’d never been the greatest at physical activities, was left in the dust.

After a few minutes of running, Beckett slowed down, giving up on the chase, “I’ve lost it,”

A huffing and out of breath Myles caught up with him, and weakly said, “Cut,”

* * *

Myles stood alone next to a whiteboard. He was in the kitchen, judging from the counters, stove and the gap between them where a fridge could have fit. He looked into the camera and spoke, “Beckett is currently setting up traps around the building, so I shall propose some possible explanations to what is happening here,”

On the whiteboard he wrote:

 _1\. Ghosts—_ _EXTREMELY UNLIKELY_

“No matter what my brother believes, it is impossible for a dead spirit to be haunting this place. I wouldn’t even have included this theory on the list of Beckett hadn’t talked about it so much,”

 _2\. Dedicated Pranksters—_ _POSSIBLE_

“Many people these days have a flair for the dramatic, so it would make sense for it to just be a regular human being behind all this. Though it does raise the question of how they had orchestrated some of the events, such as the floating sword,”

_3\. Extraterrestrial Beings—???_

“Mathematically speaking, it is impossible for us humans to be the only intelligent species in the universe, and these other species would have different biology and technology that could make some of the things that happened possible. However, if an alien species has arrived on Earth, why would they be causing trouble at a random manor?”

Myles straightened his tie, “We can safely eliminate theory number one, and theory number three can be considered later. For now, let’s focus on our second theory,”

Myles continued speaking, discussing the possibilities of mirrors and magnets. He didn’t notice the white shape slowly rising up behind him until it touched him on the shoulder.

“Boo!” it said. Myles let out a small scream, but quickly calmed himself. Beckett threw off the sheet he was wearing and giggled.

“What was that?!” Myles asked his twin.

“A ghost costume,” Beckett replied.

“That’s a white sheet,”

“It was convincing enough to scare you. You thought it was a real ghost, even though you don't believe they exists,” 

“I wasn’t scared. I was _surprised_ , and I most certainly didn’t think it was a ghost,” 

“Sure, Myles,” Beckett grinned, “I’ve finished setting up the traps,” 

“Good,” Myles pulled out his cube and pressed a button. It projected the manor’s floor plan, with several rooms marked with white dots. 

“We should be alerted as soon as something triggers one of them,” said Myles, “We just have to wait and-”

The dot marking what was once Artemis’s office began flashing red, “That was quicker than I expected,”

“We’ve got our ghost!” Beckett cheered.


	3. Chapter Three

Beckett walked into Artemis’s former office, his twin close behind him. The doors were quickly shut to prevent anything from escaping. Beckett shone his light around the room. Artemis had had a great collection of items he’d picked up throughout his adventures, and they were all stored there. Myles picked up an old book that even with his advanced skill in linguistics he couldn’t make sense of.

“There isn’t anything here,” Beckett had finished looking around.

“There is, it’s just invisible like before,” Myles said. Beckett noticed an antique vase filled with orange roses. They were still fresh.

Something bumped into the vase, and fell to the floor, shattering into tiny pieces.

“What was that?” Myles asked, “Beckett what did you do?”

“Nothing! The vase just fell down on its own!”

“It couldn’t have fallen on its own,” Myles tried to think of an explanation, “Perhaps it was a small earthquake?”

Both twins knew that was unlikely. Beckett searched for the blur they’d seen before.

“There it is!” he pointed. Beckett placed the camera on a shelf and darted out of sight.

Myles quickly formed a plan, “I’ll guard the doors, you-” he paused as he noticed Beckett chasing after the blur with a large net, “ _ Where did you get that? _ ”

It was on one of the shelves,” Beckett threw the net, and it collided with something solid which crashed to the ground.

“I caught it!” Beckett said, “Reveal yourself… ghost?”

Whatever the woman who’d slowly become visible was, she was most certainly not a ghost. Her eyes—one hazel, one blue—met Beckett’s.

“Please you get this net off me”

“Before that,” said Myles, “Tell us. Who you are and why you are here,”

“My name is Holly Short, I’m an old friend of your brother’s. I come here because this place brings back some good memories,”

Satisfied, Beckett freed her. Holly dusted herself off, “I didn’t really want to show myself to you boys. I was breaking enough LEP protocol with the whole ghost thing, talking directly to two humans would not be great if people found out,”

“So  _ you’re _ not human,” Myles noted.

“No, I’m an elf,”

“Elf?” Beckett pulled out the keychain Artemis had gifted him and compared it to Holly.

“What is that?”

“A gift from Artemis. He said it was an elf, but it doesn’t really look anything like you,”

“Mud people have really twisted ideas of what we look like,” Holly muttered,”

“So you were the one behind everything happening here?” Myles looked at Holly, “Why did you scare away those farmers?”

“At the spot where Artemis died, a bed of orange roses grew. I’m not sure how, but they’re connected to him, I know it. The humans wanted to dig them up to make space for planting  _ vegetables _ , so I stole their tools,”

“And then you attacked them with a sword?”

“They persisted, so shielded myself and waved it around. I didn’t actually mean to hurt anyone, but there was a shovel and I panicked…” she looked away, “I hope that guy’s foot is okay,”

“So we’ve solved the mystery,” Myles said, “The ghost of Fowl Manor is in fact my dead brother’s elf friend,”

“Quick question?” asked Beckett, “The warning on the wall. Did you write it in  _ real _ blood?”

“What warning?” Holly was confused, “I didn’t write any warning,”

“ _ Go away _ . It was by the portrait hallway,” said Myles, “Wasn’t that you?”

“Maybe there really is a ghost!” Beckett exclaimed.

Holly shook her head, “There were plenty of ghosts here a while ago, but I assure you, we already got rid of them all. They’ve passed on and there’s no chance… what’s happening with those shards?”

On the ground the pieces of the shattered vase began moving on their own, forming some sort of pattern.

“It’s spelling something!” Beckett zoomed in with the camera. A single word was formed.

_ Wrong _

“What does this mean?” Myles shouted. Holly moved past him and opened the doors, revealing a trail of orange rose petals.

She flew down the hallway, following the roses. The twins hesitated for a moment, then ran after her. The trail led outside towards where orange flowers grew in a spiral. In the center of it all was a pale, ghostly form.

Holly gasped, "Artemis?"

Myles and Beckett could see their older brother clearer now. They recognised him more from pictures than from memory, but it was still him.

“Artemis!" Beckett cried out. Artemis turned towards him, his lips forming words that could not be heard. Holly slowly moved towards him. She spoke as she walked, "Artemis? Can you hear me?"

Her hand reached out to touch his his, but she passed right through. Holly looked up at Artemis, and he whispered something to her.

Holly nodded, and Artemis faded away. She walked back to the twins, tears in her eyes, but a small smile on her face.

"What happened?" Myles asked, "How could Artemis be here?! And how was he able to speak to you?! What did he say?!"

At the same time Beckett said, "That was also so cool! I didn't think I'd be able to catch a real ghost on camera!"

"Are we quite sure that it was a ghost?"

"Are you still in denial," said Beckett, "We saw our  _ dead _ brother right there. It's too bad I couldn't talk to him. There were so many things I wanted to ask him,"

"Perhaps he could come back," Myles glanced at Holly, who shook her head.

"It took Artemis a lot of energy to do what he did today," she said, "It would be a while until he got the power to do that again,"

"That's upsetting," Beckett looked dejected, "On the bright side, at least me and Myles’s show will be really popular. We got an actual ghost on camera,"

"You can't post that online?!" Holly exclaimed, "It has footage of fairy magic. It could expose the People!"

"So I suppose this whole day was a waste of time?" Myles groaned. He 

"Hopefully not," said Holly, "You asked me earlier what Artemis said to me,"

"And?"

"He told me something," she said, "He told me about a way... a way to maybe bring him back,"

"That's impossible!" Myles said.

"More impossible than ghosts?" said Beckett.

"Nothing is impossible," Holly told them.

"With magic?"

"No. With a cloning machine and some DNA," Holly held her hand by her face, just next to her one blue eye.

* * *

First there had been paperwork, then there had been crime.

At Holly’s insistence, Myles Fowl had been welcomed into the makeshift lab at Foaly’s home, despite the fact that letting  _ another _ Fowl have free run of Haven’s technology was very much illegal. Double illegal considering Opal Koboi’s tech should have been destroyed years ago, not left to collect dust in Foaly’s basement.

The chrysalis was not in the best condition after almost a decade out of use, but luckily Myles was just as intelligent as his brother, though twice as insufferable. He was full of condescending remarks as powered up the machine, extracted the DNA from Holly’s blue eye and created an almost perfect clone of his brother. Key word,  _ Almost _ .

“He seems to be missing a finger,” Foaly mentioned.

“That can’t be right,” Myles looked over the scans, “I suppose we’ll have to start this whole process all over again from the top,”

“It doesn’t matter if he’s missing a pinkie,” said Beckett, who had not been invited to Haven but had shown up anyway to watch his twin work, “He could get a robot one, like Dad’s leg,”

“He’ll be fine with only four fingers,” Holly walked into the room, “We should get him to Fowl Manor,”

The shuttle ride to the surface has been awkward, and not just because of the not dead but still not alive body in there with them. we’re all worried that their plan wouldn’t work, that Artemis Fowl II wouldn’t come back.

As the group reached Fowl Manor, they were greeted by a familiar figure.

"Butler!" Beckett hugged the former bodyguard. In the first few months following his charge’s death, Butler had hung around the Fowls, not entirely convinced Artemis’s death was final. But eventually he’d lost hope, and he retired to live a quiet and lonely life in a cottage by the sea.

"Beckett, Myles. It's been a while," Butler smiled at them.

"Good to see you again," Holly shook his hand.

"You too, Holly,” Butler’s expression became serious, “Do you really think you can bring him back?"

"We hope so," she replied.

Foaly walked past, towing behind him a hover trolley with a large container on top of it, "Don't mind me, I'm just carrying Artemis’s surprisingly heavy body by myself, like I carried this whole cloning operation,”

“ _ I _ did most of the cloning work,” Myles interjected.

“Technical details,”

"Let me help you with that," Butler offered. He picked the container up with ease. He led the way to the bed of orange roses where Artemis had appeared to Holly and the twins before.

"It’s time," Holly said.

Foaly explained, "After we disconnect him from the life support, the clone won't be able to survive very long. I'd give him fifteen minutes tops,"

"That should hopefully be enough time," said Myles, "It's been eight years,” Beckett shifted nervously, “Do you really think he'll make it?"

"He was here with us a month ago,” Holly reassured him, “He definitely hasn’t passed on since then,"

“And eight years isn’t too long to be a ghost,” Foaly pointed out, “The Berserkers were like that for about ten thousand, and they were fine,”

Butler opened the container, revealing Artemis’s new body. He appeared fifteen, the age he’d been when he died. Gently, he was placed in the center of the rose spiral.

They waited.

"Come on, Artemis. Come back to us," Holly whispered, tears streaming down her face.

A minute passed, and then another. Just as they were about to give up hope, the rose nearest to Holly suddenly shed all of its petals.

“Is it happening?” Beckett asked, watching the as one by one the rose petals flew into the air, circling the clone.

“I think so,” Holly said. She knelt by Artemis as the petals slowly fell to the ground.

He opened his eyes.

“Am I dead?"

Myles wiped away his tears, while Beckett openly wept.

"Previously, yes,” said Foaly, “Currently, no,"

"And you... you're my friends?" Artemis looked at each of them in turn.

"And your family," Butler touched Artemis’s shoulder. The twins smiled at him.

“Tell me,” he said, “What happened?”

“A lot of things,” Holly said, “But let’s start at the beginning. Over a decade ago, in Ho Chi Minh City…”


End file.
